Disadvantage of Being a Triplet, I guess
by Deizu
Summary: Dewey hates being mistaken for one of his brothers. This time, though, he'll make an exception.


"Ugh." Huey and Dewey turn around at their brother's grunt of disgust with raised brows.

"You okay?" asks Huey, stepping closer to the youngest brother.

"Yeah, I'm fine. It's just-" Louie removes his hand from his beak. There's blood steadily flowing from his nose, reddening his feathers and staining his hoodie.

"You've been scratching it again, haven't you?" Huey accuses, retrieving the Junior Woodchuck Guidebook from underneath his hat and flipping it to a page to show Louie. "Rule number 347! Never-"

"Alright!" Dewey cuts him off with a laugh, to spare Louie — and himself — from another one of Huey's long-winded lectures. "We should probably get Louie to a toilet to clean up."

Huey starts to look offended at the interruption, but at the reminder of Louie's current situation, places the guidebook back under his hat. "I'll take him," he offers. "Why don't you go and save us a seat?"

"Sure thing." Dewey enters the cafeteria as his brothers round the corner to the restroom.

The cafeteria is unsurprisingly crowded, but Dewey spots an empty table on the far side of the room and immediately makes a beeline for it.

As he's halfway across the ceramic tiles of the cafeteria, he hears someone shout, in a terrifying volume that could wake the dead and make them wet their pants, "Hey!"

All activity in the cafeteria stops. The word echoes around the room twice before fading into complete silence. Dewey halts in the middle of a step, turns to look for the source, and instantly regrets finding it.

An older kid, a fifth grader probably, eyes glaring, face so chock-full of piercings Dewey's surprised he's still allowed in school, is very clearly making his way towards him.

The other students part in front of him as if he were a messiah, although it's the opposite that's true, creating a clear pathway toward the wide-eyed kid in blue in the middle of the cafeteria.

The beagle towers over Dewey. He narrows his eyes and bares his teeth. "You got a lotta nerve, showing your face in front of me after what you did last week."

Dewey has no idea what he did last week.

"I-" His eyes dart around at the crowd of students surrounding him, hoping to spot his brothers in the array, unlikely though it might be, before settling back onto the beagle's face when he doesn't see them. "What did I do?"

He gets punched, in the face.

"Maybe that jogged your memory, _Huey_?" the beagle sneers.

Dewey is absolutely sure he's not Huey, but he's also absolutely sure, whoever this guy was, he doesn't want him anywhere near his brother. He plays along.

"Oh, right," Dewey chuckles, despite the pain from his face he's certain is starting to bruise. "Sorry about that. Won't do it again. How about we try to get along from now on?"

"No can do, Duck. You got my cigs taken away. It's payback time."

Dewey feels a blow to his gut. It completely knocks the wind out of him, and leaves him gasping on his knees until a punch snaps his head to the side. He hears the onlookers start to chant "fight".

It's more of a one-sided beating than a fight, but that doesn't seem to deter the chanters.

Dewey feels punch after punch, kick after kick. It's only when he thinks he's about to pass out from the pain that he hears a teacher step in.

There's a bit of a scuffle, and then the angry cussing is gone. He's lifted onto his feet by a pair of gentle hands.

It's Huey. He can tell by the red he sees when he blinks his bleary eyes open. Or maybe that's his blood? He can't really tell.

Uncle Donald is there when they enter the principal's office. His whole face turns red when he sees Dewey and suddenly he's screaming at the beaver behind the desk when just a moment before, the triplets could hear his panicked but still rather polite voice through the door.

The principal babbles apologies, evidently taken aback by the abrupt switch. He follows Uncle Donald to the door when the duck ushers his nephews out, but Uncle Donald yells "This isn't over!" and slams the door in the poor man's face.

Dewey is rushed to the hospital, in spite of his unending protests. He knows from experience how expensive hospitals are, and Uncle Donald's supposed to be at a job interview, but instead he's here, risking a speeding ticket to get another chunk of his meager savings squandered.

He stays in a room in the foul-smelling, money-eating building for three days and three nights, thanks to a couple of bruised ribs, an ankle fracture and a mild concussion. His brothers and uncle visit him after school every day of his hospitalisation. His brothers cry when they see him on the first day, wrapped up from head to toe in bandages. Huey, especially, was particularly distraught.

"This is all my fault!" he cries.

Dewey assures him it wasn't. Huey doesn't seem to believe him.

He's finally allowed to go home on the fourth day, but not before a multitude of medications are pushed into Uncle Donald's arms. In exchange for a hefty price, of course.

Dewey glares at the thick stack of paper as it's passed between his uncle and the lady at the desk.

His uncle notices. He smiles at him reassuringly. Dewey smiles back, but he doesn't feel reassured at all.

The trip back home is silent. Uncle Donald gave up on conversation when the triplets wouldn't stop giving one-worded answers, if they answered at all.

They reach the docks after a half hour drive. Huey and Louie rush to help grab Dewey's new crutches from the trunk. Uncle Donald stops them.

"I have to talk to Dewey," he tells them, and then sends them into the houseboat to wait.

Uncle Donald crouches down in front of Dewey, who's seated at the doorway of the car. "Don't worry about the money. We'll figure something out. Just focus on healing for now," he tells Dewey.

"Okay," Dewey answers, because what else can he do other than heal.

He stays at home for two whole weeks before he insists on going back to school.

He walks the halls with his brothers pressed closely on both sides. It makes walking with his crutches a little hard, but he's not about to tell them that.

A few faces he recognises from the crowd of chanters quickly turn away when they make eye contact. Dewey ignores them.

He quickly learns that the beagle was expelled for beating a fellow student half to death. Dewey thinks it's a bit of an exaggeration, but based on the pity he can see on everyone's faces when he passes by, he feels he's the only one who does.

Well, at the very least, Dewey doesn't have to worry about the beagle coming after either of his brothers anymore, and to him, that was all that mattered.


End file.
